


It is Better to Have Loved

by orphan_account



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Character Study, F/M, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Melancholy, No Dialogue, Please read tho I spent like half an hour on this, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 07:39:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14515572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Hey-o folks apparently all I can write is angst so guess who's back on their bullshit? It's me.





	It is Better to Have Loved

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Similes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6041617) by [lostinparallel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostinparallel/pseuds/lostinparallel). 



> Hey-o folks apparently all I can write is angst so guess who's back on their bullshit? It's me.

It’s the way of things, Magnus supposes, to suffer.

Not just in the Clave, though it’s hardly alien to suffer there. No, in life, you suffer. The ideals of mankind have forever been chasing hope, health, happiness. What one can truly not have forever. Not even him.

He’s no stranger to pain. He saw his mother, the twisted knife protruding from her breast as the light dimmed from her eyes, casting shadows of death and despair. He knows what it felt like to stand over the railing, wind whipping in his face as his breath hitched as he planned to join her. He’s seen billions die, unable to be saved. Fear flickered beneath their faces as they left. He wonders if his mom felt the same fear. He knew he did.

He’s been around for centuries upon centuries. He’s fought in wars, courted thousands, and lived and lived and lived again, even when he didn’t want to. And he’s still never met someone like Alec before. Someone so confident in their strength yet so weak in their heart. Proud but afraid. Young but wiser than most. Magnus thinks he’d like Cleopatra.

When he meets Lydia, he thinks she’s beautiful. She knows more than she lets on, but she respects Magnus all the same. He likes her. He wishes Alec did, so he wouldn’t have to suffer. But he knows Alec won’t. And his life is so short. Magnus considers casting curses, bringing rage upon those who force Alec to be who he’s not. He knows he won’t.

It was like fire when they first kissed, and Magnus knew he was in too deep. He couldn’t stop himself, not after this. Briefly, he thinks of pushing him away. Alec is too precious, too naïve to be pulled into this life, this suffering. But Alec pulls back and he sees in his eyes that he’s suffered before. Magnus thinks that’s a strange look to have after a kiss. He can see his mirrored reflection in Alec’s eyes.

It was like fire again when they broke up. Flames licked the sides of his face, extracting water from his eyes. He doesn’t cry. He’s in pain, his whole body is in pain and he remembers the bridge, recalls his relief. Then he recalls Camille. He snaps his finger, just muscle memory of his theatrics, and disappears somewhere cold.  
When Alec comes back, he can’t help it. He loves him, and this is when he knows it. It hurts but Alec is begging, and Magnus has never seen that before. He wants to hold him, so he does. It hurts. He thinks. Seventeen thousand eight hundred fifty-eight. Magnus wonders what Alec would think.

Their sex isn’t soft and sweet, but it isn’t rough either. It’s filled with a desperate sort of longing, and Magnus wonders if it’s always going to be this way. Magnus wonders what else he’d rather it be. He can’t think of anything. Alec doesn’t comment.

Alec says the l word first. Magnus jokes it should be the ‘g’ word, but it sounds hollow even to his ears. He wonders if Alec watches tv. He thinks he’d like the show, if not for the noticeable lack of penises. Alec looks away, and Magnus doesn’t know where it all went wrong.

The first time he kills for Alec, he wonders if Alec would do the same for him. Alec loves him, he said. But it was no secret Alec detested killing, more, even, than he detested downworlders and those who don’t follow the rules of the Clave-his Parabatai was the only logical exception. He wonders if Alec would grow to hate him. He hopes not.

When Magnus said those three words, there were no jokes. He had downed a glass of cheap whiskey, bracing himself for the reaction. He wasn’t supposed to fall in love. He wonders if Alec knows that. He loves that naïve boy.

It’s years later when Alec hands him something, and Magnus stares at it. He’s no stranger to modern customs, but he knows Alec is. When he looks back at Alec, he’s kneeling and saying words buzzed out by the adrenaline in his head, and Magnus laughs and pulls him up for a kiss. People are staring, he knows how it must look to have a thirty-year-old man propose to someone who looks in their early twenties, and he scoffs, teleporting Alec and himself somewhere they can be together.  
Alec is forty-five when he dies. Really, it was either luck or a blessing that he survived so long. Jace was long gone, and Clary with her. They died in a fire at Hotel DuMort that a rogue group of werewolves had set in a hopes to kill Simon, the ambassador. They succeeded. Clary dies trying to save him, and Jace trying to save her. Magnus thinks it’s all ironic, a sort of circle of life. Alec cries. He doesn’t. Alec is the one without tears when he lays on that bed. His arms shake, but he reaches out to brush Magnus’s tears away. Halfway there, it falls back. Magnus knows there is nothing he can do to save him.

Fifty years later, he forgets Alec’s face. He stares at the photographs; old tech and two dimensional. They’re weathered and Alec’s smile looks more pained every passing day. He takes a lighter, burning it up and placing it on a roll of tobacco. Alec floats away, and now Magnus knows he’ll never remember his face in this life. Briefly, he wonders if warlocks can die of lung cancer.

It’s a hundred years when he’s approached by a petite young girl. She’s the great great great granddaughter of Lydia, and her smile is shy but her eyes are bright and warm. She asks him and he replies ‘eighteen.’ He asks her and she says hopefully, one. Magnus isn’t fixed. He hasn’t been, ever since he was a kid. But now, he feels okay.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment I love criticism it actually really motivates me so go ahead.


End file.
